March 1, 2008 12:02 PM
African and Sicilian immigrants once found a common bond in New Orleans in that they both were poor and social outcasts. The same was true with blacks and the few surviving American Indians. The circumstances triggered a blending of cultures. Black men began to dress like Indians on Mardi Gras and then reappear in costumes on the Sicilian feast day for St. Joseph. In recent years, the second appearance of the Indians, now most often on a weekend close to March 19 (St. Joseph’s Day), has absorbed a bit of American popular culture terminology to be known as “Super Sunday.”
Thus, on a given Lord’s Day in March, sequined men dance and sing chants with yet another influence, the Caribbean. Pictured here is a tribal member along Bayou St. John, not far from where voodoo worshippers once danced on St. John’s Eve. In a town as culturally fertile as New Orleans, not even suppression can stop determined people. They just find yet another new way of expression.